Travel by Twitter - Cape Town locals market their city

Michael Wolf conducts a design tour in The Fringe

Cape Town Tourism’s latest digital marketing campaign has garnered excellent exposure for Cape Town locally and internationally, strengthening the argument for social media marketing as a crucial part of tourism destination marketing. It also illustrated the power of mobilising local citizens as marketers of their city.

Between 27th July and 5th August 2012, four international digital media travel influencers and bloggers were hosted by Cape Town Tourism on a media trip as part of Cape Town Tourism’s iAmbassador’s campaign. The venture forms part of Cape Town Tourism’s efforts to promote the destination across a number of focused, influential digital platforms. The campaign impacted particularly on social media platform Twitter, where the hashtag #LoveCapeTown measured in with over 36 million Twitter impressions in just over a week. Tweet impressions are the total number of times tweets about #LoveCapeTown were delivered to Twitter streams, or the number of overall impressions generated as measured by social measuring site www.tweetreach.com.

A virally sourced Tweet-up, held at the beginning of the bloggers’ stay, asked followers to contribute their itinerary suggestions to the travellers who were tracking the tag on Twitter; interacting and asking questions. The session resulted in 1 500 Cape Town-impassioned tweets, proving that the citizens of Cape Town are in fact the best ambassadors of their destination.

Says Cape Town Tourism CEO, Mariëtte du Toit-Helmbold; “We are a new breed of travellers. Just five years ago, travelling was very different. Today’s travellers are ‘Digital Nomads’ and have a wealth of information available to them in an instant. Travellers now have the opportunity to explore vastly different experiences in a country and are not limited to what a guidebook tells them. Travel has become much more experiential – people are no longer satisfied with being spectators, but want to participate and get up close and personal with the destinations they visit. Speaking to the new storytellers of this travel age is what will keep us relevant – and these storytellers are interested in what the people of the destinations they visit are saying. They want to get off the bus and infiltrate communities and understand first-hand what it means to live here, where we’ve come from, our future plans and dreams.”

Top tweeter, Klout influencer and Cape Town iAmbassador, Melvin Boecher (@Traveldudes and traveldudes.org) remarked that; “The engagement of Capetonians in the #LoveCapeTown campaign was really impressive, I haven't seen this in any other blog trip campaign so far.” All of the bloggers reported a spike in followers on their social media platforms as a result of the campaign.

Whilst the #LoveCapeTown hashtag ultimately clocked up over 36 million Twitter impressions, it is still difficult to measure the impact of these statistics. Says Du Toit-Helmbold; “We know that this campaign was a success from many points of view. It was instant – and yet there are still many more blogs and tweets that will follow as a result to ensure maximised exposure and reach for Cape Town. It also crossed over onto many other platforms (blogs, Twitter, facebook, Instagram, Pinterest) as today’s social media influencer is multi-channelled. The campaign was followed with interest by traditional media, but the biggest success of this campaign was the citizen engagement it led to. For us, it proves that often we should just initiate and guide the conversation, setting up platforms where it can unfold. Cape Town knows how to sell itself!”

In terms of actual return on investment, Cape Town Tourism agrees that there is no one reliable tool to measure the value of social media, but there is no denying the importance of digital media marketing. Says Du Toit-Helmbold; “We see this campaign as one in which we piqued interest and that was our intention. Now we have to convert that interest into a community that can help us drive more awareness and ultimately conversion and more visitors to Cape Town. People do not just arrive in a destination; they do research beforehand and social media - as an extension of word of mouth - is influencing more and more travel decisions. We are acutely aware that word of mouth through social media is the most powerful tool for any destination marketer today and if we can continue to mobilise more local voices to help promote Cape Town through their own on-line networks of friends and followers, we have a winning recipe. Our work in digital media marketing is attracting global attention and we will be presenting case studies at the forthcoming World Travel Market in London.”

With a background in finance, Velvetescape (@velvetescape and velvetescape.com), Keith Jenkins, is a professional travel influencer who feels that bloggers and social media influencers can play an important and authentic role in delivering an unabridged, unscheduled version of a destination. Says Jenkins; “The Cape Town Tourism team showed a great level of flexibility (the bloggers' itinerary changed as new ideas streamed in), dedication and responsiveness to all parties involved.”

Having already launched a digital toolkit (with downloadable marketing elements that can be used by the international travel trade to ‘sell’ Cape Town) and having grown more than 250 000 fans on their facebook page I ♥ Cape Town, Cape Town Tourism is poised to spread its message further across the digital space with an exciting Facebook-based campaign due to launch in September as the conversation continues to flow.

Low resolution images of the iAmbassador’s during their stay in Cape Town can be found here. High resolution images are available upon request.

About the influencers:

Keith Jenkins left a career in banking to become a fulltime traveller. He shares his experiences with upward of 13 000 Twitter followers (@velvetescape) and blogs about his journeys at velvetescape.com.

Melvin Boecher has over 78 000 Twitter followers (@traveldudes) and is the founder of traveldudes.org an exchange of travel tips and insider info.

Nellie Huang is a culture and adventure traveller who takes over 19 000 Twitter followers (@wildjunket) along on her global wanderings. She also co-produces an online magazine wildjunket.com.

Adventure traveller Matt Long shares his adrenaline moments with over 13 000 Twitter followers (@landlopers) and has a blog of the same name Landlopers.com. He is a respected Lonely Planet blogger and is noted on several platforms as a top blogger. His insights and the fact that he has a job and family continue to engage would-be travellers in similar circumstances.